House flies

Instead of complaining about all the rain we're getting, should we all switch to complaining about how HOT it is?

Warmer temperatures speed up development time of insects.  This means that they can reproduce and offspring reach adulthood faster allowing them to produce their offspring  which will reach adulthood rapidly and so on.  Do you see how this can cause pest problems?

The insect I'm focusing on today is the house fly. Why this particular insect?  Well, they are the ones that currently drive me crazy when I'm making dinner.  Having them buzzing around while I'm prepping food isn't ideal.  And please don't tell me about hanging bags of water....it doesn't work.  My fly problems are further compounded because my lab chases them around the house without regard to where she is going, so she is jumping around, banging into everything, snapping at them with her jaws.  It's amusing until she plows into you.

So since we all pretty much know what a housefly looks like, I'll skip to the nitty-gritty....what to do about them in your house.  For the adults, it's really best to get a fly swatter or something similar to smack them with (good old fashioned mechanical control!).  I get rather obsessive about stalking flies around my house which is now much more difficult since the dog is trying to "help".  There are also things such as fly strips which can physically trap the adults, but be aware that you will have a strip of dead or struggling flies dangling in your house.

The best way to deal with house flies is to locate possible sources where the maggots (baby flies or larvae) are developing.  This is going to most likely be associated with some sort of organic matter.  I, personally, am going to clean out my garbage and recycling cans of all the funk that has accumulated (not the actual garbage or recyclables, but the stuff that leaks out into the bottom). The other thing that I need to do is get on a more regular schedule of picking up the dog waste in the backyard and throwing it away.  I usually do that once per week, but I need to double up now that it's warmer.  Of course, I'm not going to be able to get rid of ALL the house flies, so I will keep my fly swatter (and dog) nearby.

The flies are everywhere!

Blow fly.

Have you been dealing with as many flies at your house this month as I have?  Whenever I'm cooking there seems to be that ONE FLY that is buzzing around driving me crazy.  I grab the flyswatter and slowly stalk around the kitchen trying to hunt it down.  Sometimes I'm fortunate enough to smack it down out of the air and smash it on the floor.  Most times I whizz the swatter through the air and completely miss which, after about 15 minutes of obsessing over the ONE FLY, really enrages me.

I've been dealing mostly with blow flies, but I've also seen some house flies and this week I had two outbreaks of fruit flies- one in the kitchen and one in the boy's bathroom (we'll come back to this).  I also had the pleasure of discovering maggots all over the garbage can last week when I took out the garbage one morning.  Apparently, something yummy was thrown out and the flies went crazy. The garbage can was sprayed with some pesticide and when I checked on the maggots that evening they were dead.  The fruit flies in the kitchen were coming from and over-ripe pineapple that I had left on the counter; it's now in the refrigerator until I can cut it up.  The fruit flies in the boy's bathroom were a bit perplexing until he told me he threw away an apple core in his garbage.

A glueboard from a fly light I have by the backdoor.

Yes, it's that time of year when fly populations go crazy.  With hot weather, fly life cycles speed up and the population can grow very quickly.  Adults can be killed fairly easy with things like fly swatters.  Some people like to use fly paper or water traps (the fly traps need to be the actual traps that have the stinky pheromone lure, not just a ziptop baggie filled with water), but if you choose to use them place away from doors or areas where you spend your time.

The best way to manage fly populations is to manage the source- where they are coming from.  Some ideas to help reduce flies at your house:

• take garbage & recycling out on a regular basis
• clean garbage & recycling bins every few weeks
• pick up any animal waste and dispose of it several times per week
• remove any dead/ decaying animals from the area
• place fruit in a paper bag to ripen

Overrun with flies? Me too!

My family has a new pastime when we sit down to eat dinner.  Besides sharing our activities and things we learned and telling the boy (yet again) the story about the mean dragon, we stalk flies.  Have you been having a problem with flies?  They are driving me crazy...I think they're following me.  Hubby has compared them to Sammael from Hellboy, where you kill one and it multiplies.  The boy screeches "Mommy, get the fly smacker!" anytime he sees one fly past.  I am getting better at whacking them and even killed one when it flew past me in the air.

House fly.

People may be seeing house flies or, as in our case, blow flies.  These flies become more prevalent in the summer months due to an increase in population and a quick life cycle.  Under optimal conditions (such as now) they can go from egg to adult in 7 days!

House flies are about 3/8 of an inch with 4 dark stripes on the thorax.  The old "kid-thriller" of a fly spitting on your food when it lands is true; house flies have sponging mouthparts and need to dissolve solid food with saliva before slurping it up.  Adult females can lay hundreds of eggs.  Eggs are laid in warm, moist organic material in what I call "funky" areas- garbage, fecal material, decaying fruits and vegetables, lawn clippings or unmanaged compost piles. 

Blow flies resemble house flies, but are prettier (if possible with a fly).  They come in metallic colors of blue, bronze, green or black.  They lay their eggs in the same types of areas as house flies, but also are important a decomposers with animal carcasses.

Blow fly.

If you have a huge amount of flies emerge at once in your house, look for a broken sewer pipe or dead animal.  Also make sure that the garbage is being taken out often enough.  Since I don't have large numbers of flies at one time in my house paired with watching flies come in as the boy stands in the doorway arguing with me about some random item (like possibly closing the door so as to not let flies in....), my flies are coming in from outside.  I also know why I have them in the backyard- animal feces and the garbage area.  I pick up the dog poop at least once a week during the summer, but I think I need to bump that up to twice.  My garbage and recycling cans are already well away from any doorways to reduce flies from having easy access.  I also plan on cleaning my garbage and recycling cans out with soapy water and finishing it off with a 10% bleach solution rinse.

Other items to consider would be excluding the home to keep flies and other wee-beasties out.  There are also fly traps that contain a lure, but that's a little more effort than I want to expend.  I guess I'll stick to keeping my fly smacker (as the boy calls it) handy since I refuse to hang up random bags of water to "scare" off the flies.

Water filled bags to scare off house flies?!

So what’s up with the bags of water that people hang up to get rid of flies? I’ve always wondered this myself, so I decided to do some digging. Theories I found include: flies see their reflection and are frightened off, flies don’t like movement so the bag swaying in the breeze bothers them, the bag reflects people or other objects that are in the area and frighten the flies away or that the refraction of light through the bag of water disorients the fly.

I also found an article from an entomologist in North Carolina that actually ran a test on the fly-water-bag-repellent theory and found that areas with water bags hanging up attracted more flies. He counted fecal smears from the flies and everything! Maybe people can poke some small holes in the bags and let the water cool them off since they don’t seem to work on flies.

House flies typically develop on animal feces, garbage or other decaying organic matter. To keep them out of your house, make sure that you have screens covering your windows without holes or gaps in it and that the weather stripping around your doors and windows has a good seal. You should also make sure that your garbage cans are stored away from the house and have tight fitting lids. It's also a good idea to wash your garbage cans out 1-2 times each month with soapy water. If you have pets, picking up their waste 1-2 times a week from the yard can help cut down on fly breeding sites. If you compost, make sure to turn your compost and keep it going so it doesn't begin to get funky. If you do happen to have flies get inside your house, fly swatters are great tools of the trade.

BB's update......

Well, it's been a somewhat busy week this week. BB's doing great and kicking- A LOT! We went to a meet the doctor's night on Tuesday to try to find a pediatrician and I think we succeeded. It's so weird picking a doctor for someone who isn't even here yet. One of the doctors looked at me and asked hesitantly if I was expecting. I was a bit taken aback since I think I look huge, but then again, I know what I looked like before. Also, I found out today (and I'm a bit miffed about it), according to my obstetrician I am a bit far along in my gaining of weight, so I have to cut back on the ice cream I've been eating. It's just so HOT outside and ice cream is just too yummy! I personally don't think I've been that bad in my eating habits, but my weight is telling a different story. Oh well....back to carrots for snacks...eating healthy ALL THE TIME gets old after awhile.....